Page:The Boy Travellers in the Russian Empire.djvu/243

Rh later page. We were all eyes, ears, and thoughts for the Kremlin, and nothing else.

"Nobody can tell positively what the word 'kremlin' comes from, but it certainly means fortress or space enclosed with strong walls. The walls of the Kremlin of Moscow are about one mile and a half in circuit, and from fifty to sixty feet high; they are entered by five gates, of which the principal is the spaski, or 'Redeemer.' This gate was built in 1491, and over it there is a picture of the Redeemer of Smolensk. Our guide told us we must remove our hats as we passed through this gateway, out of respect for the ways of the people. Formerly a failure to do so was severely punished, but now there is no compulsion about it. Not even the Emperor is exempt from the custom, and you may be sure we did not attract attention by our neglect.

"It was in front of this gate that executions formerly took place, and the victims offered their last prayers to the Redeemer of Smolensk. Happily there are now no signs of these executions, and everything has an air of peace and happiness. The gate of next importance is the Nikolsy, or Nicholas Gate, which is ornamented and made sacred in the eyes of orthodox Russians by the picture of St. Nicholas of Mojaisk. The gate was partly destroyed by order of Napoleon; a large quantity of gunpowder was placed under it and fired, but the explosion only split the tower in the middle and up to the frame of the picture. The glass over the picture and the lamp burning in front of it were not harmed. As the occurrence was considered in the light of a miracle, an inscription describing it was placed there by Alexander I.

"Another gate, called the Troitska, or Trinity, is memorable as the one by which the French entered and left the Kremlin in 1812. Several times it has been the passage-way of conquering armies. Besides the French in the nineteenth century, it admitted the Poles in the seventeenth, the Tartars in the sixteenth (1551), and the Lithuanians in the fourteenth centuries. Only a small part of the Kremlin was destroyed in the great fire of 1812; it was held by Napoleon's troops when the fire broke out, and when the the invaders retired their attempts to blow up the walls and ignite the buildings did not succeed.